


Ten Years Before I Came Back to Life

by DarthAnimus



Series: Vesperia Soulmarks AU [2]
Category: Tales of Vesperia
Genre: Gen, Platonic Soulmates, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-10
Updated: 2017-05-10
Packaged: 2018-10-30 08:49:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10873326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarthAnimus/pseuds/DarthAnimus
Summary: The dead don't have Marks. This is something Raven knows personally. He doesn't know what to think when he starts getting new ones.





	Ten Years Before I Came Back to Life

The dead don't have Soulmarks. It made sense. The dead couldn't be influenced by anyone and they couldn't grow or change through meeting someone. They couldn't meet anyone period, as they were buried in the ground with their skin as bare as when they'd first joined life.

This was the simple fact of life: dead were done with the world. That's why Damuron felt the entire world tilting on its axis when he woke up groggy from surgery, stumbled to the nearest mirror, and saw that his throat was bare.

Damuron had lived a pretty aimless life before he'd been forced to join the Imperial Knights by his father. Frankly, it wasn't the Knights themselves that had changed it all, but meeting Casey, the woman who'd eventually become his captain.

Casey was inspiring, to put it as simply as humanely possible. She had clear ideas about right and wrong and she followed them with conviction. She cared, both about people and the state of the world. Being around her, watching her and following her made it easy for Damuron to care too. Except he also cared about Casey, more than he should have.

Damuron knew that, as long as he felt the way he did, he couldn't show Casey the Mark that had appeared on his throat, the Mark that symbolised how much she'd changed his views on the future. It wouldn't have been fair or equal with her having feelings for someone else. Damuron had thought that he'd have time, that, once he got over Casey, he could approach her as a friend and tell her: "You've helped me become a better person. I can show you how."

Now it was too late for everything Damuron had planned. He might fall in love with someone else, but he'd never entirely get over Casey because of how traumatically he'd lost her. He'd never show her his Mark, because she was dead and because he was dead and because the Mark was now gone.

He tore off his bandages when he saw that Casey's Mark had vanished. It stung, the fabric clinging to his body with congealed or dried blood. Several of his wounds began bleeding again as he desperately tried to see his back in the mirror, peering over his bloodied right shoulder.

The Casey Brigade had been a completely indescribable experience to Damuron. They'd all been so different with different backgrounds and values but they'd all been brought together by their similar morals and their respect for their commanding officer. Damuron had known he could count on each of his squadmates to have his back and the Marks of all of his friends and allies together had clustered together on his back to form a wing of unwavering support.

His shoulder was bare.

It just figures that while he was hyperventilating over _that_ became also the exact moment his eyes finally spotted his chest and he realized that the feeling of a weight in his chest wasn't just metaphysical. The stripped-away bandages had revealed something absolutely inhuman protruding out of his chest. Seeing it, barely comprehending, Damuron temporarily lost his mind from pure horror.

After the fit was over, Damuron was left lying down on his sickbed, chest full of scratch marks and the undersides of his nails crusty with blood. His arms had bruises from both the doctor and Commandant Alexei wrestling him down and his mind came bruised from what Alexei was saying to him.

These were desperate times, the Commandant told Damuron. There weren't many people that Alexei could trust and Damuron was the only survivor of his unit. Damuron's home town had become a casualty of war. Damuron really only had two choices here: get up and help Alexei or lie down and die.

Damuron had already died once and it had been painful in every single way imaginable. The thought of dying again left him feeling paralyzed with fear. So he made his choice.

In the end, Damuron didn't die, but he didn't live either. Instead, Schwann Oltorain stepped into Alexei's service, completely devoted simply because his life had nothing else in terms of content. Normal people woke up in the morning wondering what their agenda for the day would be, Schwann was only concerned for _Alexei's_ agenda.

A dead man walking among the living, Schwann didn't have anything to offer to the people around him, nor did anyone have anything he wanted. In his darker moments Schwann admitted to himself that sometimes he feared that if he did connect with people, his skin would still remain blank, that he really was dead. He already thought that, and he didn't want to be proven correct.

Schwann always dressed in layers. There were multiple reasons for this. One was to hide the obvious slope of the blastia embedded in his chest. The other was that he just felt constantly cold.

The dead were cold. They had no body heat. Schwann remembered that his Marks had always felt warm with affection. Maybe the dead went cold because their Marks left them, taking their warmth away with them.

Schwann suspected he was cold in more ways than just physical. He didn't really know what it meant to want something anymore. When a spying-slash-assassination assignment to Dahngrest left him at the mercy of one surprisingly agreeable Don Whitehorse, Schwann really had no reason to agree or disagree when the man offered to spare his life and secrets in return for becoming a double agent.

Schwann still remembered what Damuron had felt when he'd died. It had been colder than any shivers he got these days. He'd rather not die, even when living was at best lukewarm.

Like Alexei, Whitehorse gave Schwann another name to use when working for him. Don's choice in names wasn't half as grandiose as Alexei's, but there was a boyish sense of humour to the man when he grinned widely at Schwann and named him after a different bird. Raven found himself returning the smile.

What Alexei and Whitehorse expected from their messenger bird varied greatly. Alexei wanted Schwann to be aloof, but not too distant, to set an example for the other Imperial Knights on proper conduct, and to defend Alexei's interests against the machinations of the council.

The Imperial Knights didn't have many long-serving knights left, and many of the newcomers were in awe of the Captain who was a hero of the Great War, so Schwann didn't need to do much to impress his subordinates. One recruit, a man closer to Schwann's own age rather than being a kid fresh out of school, had actually looked at Schwann with what looked suspiciously like moved tears in his eyes.

As for the council, sometimes Raven's abilities actually worked to Schwann's advantage when evidence needed to be dug up or traps planted.

Whitehorse, on the other hand, needed Raven mostly for what knowledge Schwann had of the Knights, which was, fairly enough, quite a lot. However, as time passed, Whitehorse also used Raven as a messenger, entrusting his agent with important messages and goods. Raven didn't think much about it as he ran these errands, until the Don once, after a yet another successful mission, clapped Raven on the back, nearly toppling the smaller man to the ground, and invited him to share drinks.

The evening was easy. The drinks were no mere aside for a debriefing, but simply there to be enjoyed between friends. Raven fell asleep that night feeling strangely warm.

The scheming in Zaphias made Alexei grow colder along the years. He grew more and more distant with Schwann as well, sending him off more often than having him in the capital. On the flipside, Raven and Whitehorse grew closer, their facade of a relationship becoming a genuine and trusting friendship, making Raven actually feel relieved that Don Whitehorse knew all of his deepest and darkest secrets, from his identity to the state of his body.

It was when Schwann was trying to figure out if he could come up with an excuse to leave for Dahngrest, mere days after returning to Zaphias, that Schwann realized that he actually _preferred_ Dahngrest to Zaphias a great deal. That was when the Mark appeared, a bright red that was so eye-catching and hot-blooded that it could stand for no one other than Don Whitehorse, right in the middle of Schwann's palm.

That, night when Schwann had made it back to his quarters, he spent nearly an hour going over every inch of his skin, looking for another Mark. If he was actually capable of still gaining new Marks, there had to be one from the person he'd done anything and everything for.

Finally, Schwann found a burgundy feather on the bottom of his right foot. Of course it'd be in the last place he looked, Schwann mused, scowling at the Mark. No wonder he felt so heavy so often, with this thing dragging him down.

It was really amazing how a Mark that controlled his life so much was in a place he couldn't even see himself without purposefully looking for it. Just as well, Schwann decided, as it wasn't like it changed anything. Schwann knew what his obligations were, what promises he'd made.

Promises were easy enough, but lying was another story. Both Axelei and Whitehorse required dishonesty from their agent, and Damuron had always been too sincere to lie convincingly. Neither was it a skill that either of the men he'd become had learned.

Schwann generally got away with not telling the truth by speaking as little as possible. Fewer words meant fewer lies he could get caught on. It all became easier when Schwann got a new lieutenant under his command; Leblanc would speak enough for both of them and be not only Schwann's sword, but his voice in Schwann's absence. It was an effective status quo.

It also helped that, as long as you were a trusted captain, you didn't need to offer people much more than an order to get them to comply. Explanations and lies were therefore unnecessary.

Raven and Schwann might have had different dispositions, but in many ways they were equal. Raven expressed the things Schwann kept suppressed, said all the things Schwann stayed silent on. He was as talkative as Schwann was quiet. Raven dodged any queries into his tall tales by simply speaking more. He mastered the act of affable chatter, so that no one would look too far into the things he said, so that no one would notice the inconsistencies.

Whether you're a terrible or good liar, it's always best to tell as much of the truth as possible, just to keep your stories straight. Raven's lies were a mixture of omitted facts, truths spoken in a sarcastic tone and outright fibbing. Still, it worked, because the point wasn't a matter of obscuring information as it was to keep people from looking for it to begin with.

No one really questioned Raven, even as they knew he was lying through his teeth. Because his dishonesty was out in the open, people thought they were on top of things, that they had him figured out.

It just figures that it wasn't the lies that were the dangerous part about who he was. It was always the promises.

Raven hadn't bothered to grow since he'd allowed Don Whitehorse to mean something to him. That was why, when the man died, to preserve order in the face of utter chaos, it felt like all warmth fled his body once more as the Mark on his palm grew cold with the absence of the person it stood for. Grief, felt through a Mark as dark as ever.

He couldn't remember the Mark on the sole of his foot ever being warm.

The weight of his obligation dragged him down when the Commandant's orders came to bring him the Princess for the next stage of his plan. The heavy weight of everything at Mount Temza made it all even harder to bear.

He was unexpectedly open then. Perhaps too much. He shouldn't care about these people, he knew, not with his promises to Alexei. To follow, to support, to see this all through.

Eventually, after what felt like an eternity, they reached Myorzo. Estelle looked just about as heavy as Raven felt then. There were many kinds of burdens and Raven doubted the rest of this group could lift Estelle's. It all seemed so impossible, finding a different path and changing how things would turn out.

Just as well. Raven wasn't too interested in alternative solutions. He couldn't be when he was already devoted to one course of action.

There was no reason for Raven to question what he was doing. Even so, he felt something akin to empathy over how listless Estelle was when he told her: "The Commandant requires your presence, your highness." He felt something slippery squirm in the bottom of his stomach with how readily she followed his lead, how she didn't keep insisting on how this was something she wanted to do regardless.

He would never begrudge her how she saw the good in everyone. But, it was sad to see her as bereft of hope as he was. But even that couldn't matter, because he had a job to do.

It became increasingly difficult to hang on to the concepts of duty and obligation when he changed into his knight's uniform. Travelling on the road was cumbersome; bathing opportunities were few and far between and it was usually already dark when they turned in for the night. Even if the Mark had been forming for a while, there was very little chance of it being noticed until now.

On top of Raven's foot rested a new feather-shaped Mark, the color a childish yellow.

Sluggishly, but still violently, Raven pulled his boots on, hiding the Mark as quickly as his shaking hands allowed. It didn't matter. It was too late. He was already dedicated. He would allow nothing to change his mind and it would change nothing if he did.

"So what if I wanted to stay?" Raven snapped at either himself or at the Mark, orange replacing purple as he changed outfits like he changed identities, bit by bit, trickling into the other as pieces got swapped. "It's not my choice to make."

He'd made his choice long ago, after all, and there was only one way out. He'd find it at the end of this one last sprint, he was sure.

The prison Alexei built for Estelle was nothing short of terrifying. Just being near it made Schwann's blastia ache in a way that made it hard to breathe. Regardless, he focused on the Commandant telling him of the trap he was planning for Duke.

It was easy to take on the task to face Duke for Alexei, to delay the biggest threat to his plans while Alexei buried him alive.

"I could just use the soldiers," Alexei said with only the slightest hint of coaxing to his voice. "I could still use you."

Schwann shook his head. "This is fine," he insisted. It was what he wanted.

He wanted it even more when it wasn't the Duke who showed up, but Yuri and his friends. It was perfect. He was done with the charade.

Schwann saw the disbelief on all their faces, and knew from just looking at them that they didn't want to fight. He felt the same turn in his innards as when he had when he'd noticed just how deep Estelle's despair ran.

'Don't despair,' he wanted to tell them but remained silent because Schwann wasn't the part of him that spoke. 'This is what I want.' Because, really, the one exit he'd seen, the one desire he held even stronger when he thought about yellow marring his skin and how he could never have what he really wanted.

If no other wish would be granted, then just this: he really wanted to die.


End file.
